Carton Council of Canada (CCC) has launched the third year of the organization's Community Education Award program developed to support and enhance recycling education in Canadian communities. In 2023, the Community Education Award program will focus on the provinces in Atlantic Canada including New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador.
The award program is open to organizations based in Canada's Atlantic provinces that educate residents about local recycling programs, particularly those that include food and beverage cartons. This includes municipalities, sorting centres (both municipal and privately owned), Regional Service Commissions, not-for-profit organizations, crown agencies, governmental departments, and any other organization that has recycling education as part of its mandate.
To receive the award, participating communities and organizations must show that their websites accurately and clearly define carton recycling. They will also be asked to provide at least two other examples of communications activities conducted during the year that promote recycling in general, while also prominently including cartons.
The first fifteen organizations to sign up for the program will be eligible to receive $2,000 each by demonstrating their proactive recycling education efforts, featuring food and beverage cartons. Registration opens on April 21, 2023, and will close on June 19, 2023. The participating communities will then have until November 3, 2023, to showcase their efforts and submit their work to the CCC. Content may be created in either French or English and final submissions will be accepted in both languages.
"We are very pleased to launch this initiative for a third year and to extend its reach into Atlantic Canada," says Isabelle Faucher, managing director at the Carton Council of Canada.
In Atlantic Canada, the recycling solution for cartons depends on the product. Milk, milk substitutes, and cartons containing foodstuffs other than beverages (such as soups and broths) are collected in the residential recycling system while juice and other designated beverage cartons are returned to a redemption centre or recycling depot for refund.
"Given the unique recycling approach in Atlantic Canada, it's all the more important to communicate clearly and effectively to consumers about how to recycle their cartons," says Faucher. "At Carton Council Canada, we believe that creative collaborations like our Community Education Award, have a positive impact on local awareness of recycling in general and cartons specifically. We look forward to the efforts of each participating group and their success helping educate the general public about recycling best practices and services."
In 2021, CCC launched the program in communities across Ontario and, in 2022, CCC ran the initiative in the province of Quebec.
"Our participation in the program helped us clarify many questions about the recycling of cartons with our citizens," says Jacob Bouchard of Société VIA, one of last year's participating organizations. "We then used the grant money to offer sweaters to the employees of our five plants, which made a lot of people happy."
